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Following is a question by the Hon Albert Chan and a written reply by the Secretary for Commerce and Economic Development, Mr Frederick Ma, in the Legislative Council today (December 5):
Question:
In recent years, I have received complaints from many members of the public that they were often disturbed by telemarketing calls while they were in Hong Kong or abroad. In this connection, will the Government inform this Council:
(a) whether it knows the number of complaints received in each of the past three years by the relevant authorities about nuisance caused by telemarketing calls, together with a list of the names of the organisations under complaint; and
(b) as person-to-person telemarketing calls are not covered by the Unsolicited Electronic Messages Ordinance (Cap. 593), of the circumstances under which it will reconsider regulating such calls?
Reply:
Madam President,
The Government is very concerned about the nuisance caused by spams to the public and the commercial sector. In this connection, the Unsolicited Electronic Messages Ordinance (the Ordinance) was enacted, aiming to strike the right balance between containing the problem of spams and allowing the development of legitimate and responsible electronic marketing in Hong Kong. In accordance with the Ordinance, all commercial electronic messages that have a "Hong Kong link", including faxes, emails, voice or video telephone calls (excluding person-to-person telemarketing calls) and Short Messaging Service/Multimedia Messaging Service messages, are subject to regulation. The Ordinance was passed by the Legislative Council in May 2007 and will be implemented in two phases. The first phase, starting from June 1, 2007, tackles fraud and other illicit activities related to the sending of multiple commercial electronic messages, including using harvested-address lists and hacking into computers to send commercial messages, whereas the second phase, which will come into force on December 22, 2007, will establish the rules for sending commercial electronic messages.
My reply to the questions raised by the Hon Albert Chan is as follows:
(a) Prior to the commencement of the Ordinance in June this year, there was no legislation in Hong Kong that provided for regulating promotion of products or services through telephone calls. The number of public enquiries on telemarketing calls (including both pre-recorded and person-to-person telephone calls) received by the Office of the Telecommunications Authority (OFTA) in the past three years is set out as follows:
Year Total
2005 3 622
2006 2 766
2007 (January to May) 866
Only some of those making these enquiries had provided details, including the name of the organisations making the telemarketing calls, to OFTA. Since OFTA did not have any statutory power to carry out investigation at that time, these cases had not been verified. As such, we consider it inappropriate to disclose the information of the organisations concerned which would otherwise be unfair to them.
Since the commencement of the first phase of the Ordinance and up to the end of October 2007, OFTA has received about 1 150 reports on unsolicited commercial electronic messages. Amongst these reports, only 50 cases are about telemarketing calls including less than 10 cases relating to person-to-person calls. These 50 reported cases were largely related to financial services (about 50%) and telecommunications services (about 10%). These cases are being investigated by OFTA. To ensure impartiality, it is inappropriate to disclose the names of the organisations involved before the investigation is completed.
On the whole, there is a significant downward trend in the number of enquiries made in relation to telemarketing calls, and the reports on telemarketing calls received by OFTA have only accounted for about 4% of the total reported cases after the implementation of the first phase of the Ordinance. Nonetheless, we will continue to pay close attention to the promotion of products or services through telephone calls.
(b) Although person-to-person telemarketing calls are not regulated by the Ordinance, OFTA has been closely monitoring the situation. A surveillance programme is on-going to monitor the receipt of telemarketing calls by using 200 telephone accounts not involving personal data as sample. Statistics showed that after the first phase implementation of the Ordinance, the average number of person-to-person telemarketing call received by each account is less than one per month, which is at a level similar to that before the commencement of the Ordinance.
The Administration will continue to closely monitor the situation with the full implementation of the Ordinance, including conducting on-going surveillance. In addition, we will set up an anti-spamming task force comprising representatives from all sectors of society, including chambers of commerce, telemarketing organisations, associations of the communications sector, consumer groups, and legislators, to assist the Government in monitoring the overall effectiveness of anti-spam initiatives, and to make recommendations to the Government on further actions against unsolicited electronic messages. If the nuisance caused by person-to-person telemarketing calls to members of the public tends to aggravate in future, we will consider whether or not to regulate such calls by bringing them within the scope of the Ordinance.
In addition, most of the person-to-person telemarketing calls commonly received by the public may be related to the use of personal data of the recipients. In accordance with the Personal Data (Privacy) Ordinance, the recipient may request the sender to cease to use his/her personal data for marketing purpose. If his/her request is not honoured by the sender, the recipient may complain to the Privacy Commissioner for Personal Data.
Ends/Wednesday, December 5, 2007
Issued at HKT 14:27
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